The present invention relates to a meat slicer and, more particularly, to a meat slicer of novel type provided with a circular blade adapted to rotate perpendicularly on one side of the upper part of a box-type machine frame, a meat case adapted to reciprocate horizontally on the plane of rotation of said circular blade, and a set of upper and lower conveyors provided on the upper and lower parts of the meat case and adapted to move intermittently in conjunction with the return motion of the meat case while holding a block or lump of raw meat therebetween, so that the meat block is pushed forward intermittently to the front end of the meat case with the result that said block of soft and shapeless raw meat can be sliced to a thickness of several millimeters automatically and continuously.
Hitherto in the United States there have been introduced many types of slicers designed to slice processed, solid meat materials like ham, sausage and bacon, but there has been little use of slicers adapted to slice soft, shapeless and unprocessed meat to be used, for example, for Sukiyaki cooking, due to different dietary customs.
However, occasioned by a notable trend toward diversification and internationalization of cooking in the United States in recent years, there has been an increased demand for sliced raw meat and consequently for a slicer for this purpose.
Since meat slicer of this kind is to work on raw meat which has not undergone any heat treatment, it needs to be specially contrived so as to minimize its contact with the meat to be worked on or to make the machine parts contacting the meat easily detachable for washing in water, or to expose the machine surface to easy access for washing by simply applying highly pressurized water, or to devise a structure so as to prevent the passage of the washing water into the driving mechanism of the machine.
The slicer of the present invention has been devised to satisfy all such requirements.